9 Actors Who Bailed From Their Own Sequels

They won't be back

By
Steve O'Brien

24/11/2017

Not every actor wants to return to the scene of a former triumph/crime. Here are nine who decided one was enough...

1. Keanu Reeves, Speed 2: Cruise Control

As the fifth highest grossing film of 1994, a Speed follow-up was a no-brainer for 20th Century Fox. Director Jan de Bont returned, as did breakout star Sandra Bullock, but original headliner Keanu Reeves jumped ship, telling the studio that he wasn't "ready to mentally and physically" star in another action film after having completed 1996's Chain Reaction.

Reeves later revealed to Jimmy Kimmel that: "I read the script and I was like 'ugggghhh'. It was about a cruise ship and I was thinking, 'a cruise ship is even slower than a bus and I was like, 'I love you guys, but I just can't do it.'"

The movie was a box-office bomb, and went on to scoop the Worst Sequel gong at the 1998 Golden Raspberry Awards.

2. Bill Murray, Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle

As the girls' desk-bound boss-man, John Bosley, Bill Murray was in winningly deadpan form in the first Charlie's Angels. But, come the sequel, he was nowhere to be seen.

On the original movie, Murray clashed not only with co-star Lucy Liu , but also with its director, McG, who claims the actor nutted him (to be fair, Murray has always denied this, although in a 2009 interview with The Times, he was quoted as saying that he "should be pierced with a lance, not headbutted").

So, by the time of the McG-directed follow-up, Murray was gone, with the late Bernie Mac parachuted in as his adoptive brother Jimmy Bosley.

3. Katie Holmes, The Dark Knight

The former Dawson's Creek fave starred as Bruce Wayne's childhood crush and high-flying legal eagle Rachel Dawes in Batman Begins. For reasons she's never quite 'fessed up to, she decided to sit out its critically lovebombed follow-up, with Christopher Nolan replacing her with Maggie Gyllenhaal.

"It was a decision that I made at that time and it was right for me at that moment, so I don't have any regrets," Holmes told Business Insider in 2016. "I think that Maggie did a wonderful job. But I really hope that I get to work with Chris someday."

4. Matthew McConaughey, Magic Mike XXL

Audiences swooned at the sight of Matthew McConaughey's washboard abs in the first Magic Mike, but in the years between the first and second film, McConaughey's price tag rose considerably due to his Dallas Buyers' Club Oscar win.

So, sadly, by the time Magic Mike XXL went into production in 2014, Warner Bros were no longer able to afford him.

5. Crispin Glover, Back to the Future Part II

Crispin Glover's endearingly oddball turn as Marty McFly's peeping-tom dad is one of the high points of Back to the Future, but sadly there's a whopping great Glover-shaped hole in its two follow-ups.

Despite Glover clashing with the director over the supposedly materialistic ending of the movie ("I said to Robert Zemeckis I thought it was not a good idea for our characters to have a monetary reward, because it basically makes the moral of the film that money equals happiness"), he ended up bailing from the sequels because of, well, money.

For Back to the Future Part II, George's role was cut to the bone, with bit-part actor Jeffrey Weissman donning a Glover-moulded face mask. Zemeckis also included clips of Glover from the first movie, prompting the actor to sue Universal, claiming it was an infringement of his rights. The case was settled out of court.

6. Jodie Foster, Hannibal

Jodie Foster had spent most of the 1990s reassuring fans that, yes, she would indeed be back for any Silence of the Lambs sequel that writer Thomas Harris was cooking up. But Harris' eventual follow-up, Hannibal, proved too rich for Foster's tastes, who declined the offer to return as Clarice Starling, saying the story had "betrayed" the character.

Despite a retooled ending (the book climaxes with Hannibal Lecter and Clarice becoming lovers), Foster couldn't be convinced and so Julianne Moore stepped into Clarice's FBI shoes.

7. Jim Carrey, Evan Almighty

Jim Carrey starred as a down-on-his-luck TV reporter who is given God-like powers by God himself in the 2003 comedy Bruce Almighty. But Carrey (who said he's "not a big fan of doing the same character twice") opted out of the planned sequel, and so the script was reworked to promote first movie supporting actor Steve Carell to top billing in the renamed Evan Almighty.

8. Will Smith, Independence Day: Resurgence

When Roland Emmerich's two-decades-later Independence Day sequel landed in 2016, all the main players bar two were present and correct. Randy Quaid's absence could be explained by a) his character dying in the first movie and b) the actor becoming somewhat unpredictable in the years since. But where was Will Smith?

Smith admitted it was a toss-up between him signing up for Independence Day: Resurgence or Suicide Squad. "I had the two screenplays in front of me," he said. "I had to choose between the two of those. Even the choice of going to Suicide Squad — nothing about the qualities of the movie — but the choice of trying to go forward versus clinging and clawing backwards. I do want to aggressively go forward and do new things and create and hopefully be able to stumble upon a new heyday."

Resurgence got round Smith's absence by revealing that his character, Colonel Steven Hiller, had been killed sometime after the first movie. To add insult to injury, the charisma-challenged Jessie Usher was brought in as Hillier's son, Dylan, a pilot for Earth Space Defense.

9. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Predator 2

The first Predator is a bullet-proof SF classic, the others… hmm, less so. As the only survivor from the original, Arnold Schwarzenegger's Major 'Dutch' Schaefer was the only one who could return for the sequel.

He did enter into talks with 20th Century Fox, but eventually parted company with the movie over a salary dispute. He also bailed on a small role in Shane Black's upcoming 2018 reboot, The Predator, telling Yahoo!: "They asked me, and I read it, and I didn't like it – whatever they offered."

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